Keith Floyd (1943–2009) was an English broadcaster, restaurateur and food writer. He was brought up in Somerset, England, where his mother taught him to cook. He was educated at Wellington, a local public school, although he left at the age of sixteen. He joined the Bristol Evening Post as a cub reporter—where he worked alongside the future playwright Tom Stoppard. He was commissioned into the Royal Tank Regiment in 1963 as a second lieutenant, but his career there only lasted until 1966; he left military service and moved to London and then France, where he worked in several restaurants in various roles.
In 1971 he set up his first restaurant in Bristol—Floyd's Bistro—which proved popular enough for him to open three further outlets in the city. His burgeoning empire soon collapsed and he sailed around the Mediterranean for two years, from where he exported wine to the UK. He also opened a restaurant in the south of France, but this was also unsuccessful and it closed in 1979, when Floyd returned to the UK. He opened another Bristol-based restaurant and wrote a book—Floyd's Food—which was locally published in 1981; this led to a short recipe slot on the local Radio West station. In 1983 one of his customers—David Pritchard, a television producer—suggested to Floyd that he front a television series, which resulted in Floyd on Fish, broadcast on BBC Two in late 1985. Several series followed on the BBC before the Floyd-Pritchard partnership broke up in 1993; a corresponding book appeared with each series. There were no scripts for the programmes, and Floyd ad-libbed throughout; when he ran out of words, he would sip from an ever-present glass of wine to give him time to create the next line. Pritchard's directing style and Floyd's presentation technique produced what the food writer Tom Jaine considers as "cheerful mayhem", although viewers were educated in basic techniques. He went on to say that "Floyd's performances, on or near the stove, were a refreshing departure from the prissy, controlled style then in favour at the BBC, or the alternative mode of half an hour with a French chef whose incomprehensible English made the recipes a mystery."
Paul Levy, Floyd's obituarist, considered the broadcaster had "no outstanding talent, either as a cook or as a TV presenter, no great knowledge of his subject, or any apparent passion for anything but drink. This is not to say that his first TV programmes were bad – they were, indeed, highly diverting entertainment". The programmes were also highly popular both with the public and other cooks. Following his death of heart disease in September 2009 several fellow chefs voiced their opinions of him. Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall considers that Floyd "cooked his ingredients with the love and passion of a gifted amateur", while Heston Blumenthal opines that "His enthusiasm, even when he was being a bit crotchety, jumped out of the screen. No-one made TV food programmes quite like him. He had a wealth of knowledge but there was a no-nonsense approach to it all".
| Title | Year of first publication | First edition publisher (All London) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Floyd's Food | Absolute Press | ||
| Floyd on Fish | BBC Books | ||
| Floyd on Fire: Cooking Outdoors | BBC Books | ||
| Floyd on France | BBC Books | ||
| Floyd on Britain and Ireland | BBC Books | ||
| Bracken Books | |||
| Floyd's American Pie | BBC Books | ||
| Floyd on Oz | Michael Joseph | ||
| Floyd on Hangovers | Michael Joseph | ||
| Floyd on Spain | Michael Joseph | ||
| Far Flung Floyd: Keith Floyd's Guide to Southeast-Asia Cooking | Michael Joseph | ||
| Floyd on Italy | Michael Joseph | ||
| Michael Joseph | |||
| Hot and Spicy Floyd | Penguin Books | ||
| Floyd on Africa | Michael Joseph | ||
| Cognac Cookery | Penguin Books | ||
| Keith Floyd Cooks Barbies | BBC Books | ||
| Floyd Uncorked | HarperCollins | ||
| Floyds Fjord Fiesta | Michael Joseph | ||
| Floyd on Fibre | Kellogg's | ||
| Floyd Around the Med | HarperCollins | ||
| Floyd's India | HarperCollins | ||
| Flash Floyd | Cassell | ||
| Floyd's Great Curries | Cassell | ||
| Floyd's China | HarperCollins | ||
| Floyd's Thai Food | HarperCollins | ||
| Cassell |
| Title | Year of first publication | First edition publisher (All London) | Notes | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Boxtree | Foreword only; work by Carol Payne | |||
| Floyd in the Soup | Pan Books | Autobiography | ||
| Out of the Frying Pan: Scenes from My Life | HarperCollins | Autobiography | ||
| Stirred But Not Shaken | Sidgwick & Jackson | Autobiography |
| Programme | Date | Channel | Role | Notes | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Floyd on Fish | – 20 December 1985 | BBC Two | Presenter | Seven programmes | ||
| Pebble Mill at One | – 16 May 1986 | BBC One | Presenter | – | ||
| Floyd on Food | – 28 October 1986 | BBC Two | Presenter | Six programmes | ||
| Food and Drink | BBC Two | Guest | – | |||
| Floyd on France | – 13 October 1987 | BBC Two | Presenter | Seven programmes | ||
| Vintage Floyd | – 17 December 1987 | BBC Two | Presenter | Six programmes; selected episodes from the previous two series | ||
| Aspel and Company | ITV | Interviewee | – | |||
| Open Space | BBC Two | Narrator | – | |||
| Floyd on Britain and Ireland | – 1 November 1988 | BBC Two | Presenter | Nine programmes | ||
| Floyd's American Pie | – 14 November 1989 | BBC Two | Presenter | Six programmes | ||
| BBC Two | Presenter | – | ||||
| Floyd on Oz | – 6 June 1991 | BBC Two | Presenter | Nine programmes | ||
| BBC One | Guest | – | ||||
| Floyd on Spain | – 29 September 1992 | BBC Two | Presenter | Seven programmes | ||
| Far Flung Floyd | – 17 August 1993 | BBC Two | Presenter | Seven programmes | ||
| Floyd on Italy | – 23 August 1994 | BBC Two | Presenter | Seven programmes | ||
| – 9 November 1994 | BBC Two | Presenter | Eight programmes; selected episodes from the previous series | |||
| BBC One | Presenter | – | ||||
| Floyd on Africa | – 4 June 1996 | BBC Two | Presenter | Seven programmes | ||
| Noel's House Party | BBC One | Guest | – | |||
| Floyd Uncorked | – 21 December 1998 | Channel 5 | Presenter | Eight programmes | ||
| Floyd on GMTV | – 24 December 1998 | ITV | Presenter | Twelve programmes | ||
| Floyd Around the Med | – 23 February 2000 | Channel 5 | Presenter | Nine programmes | ||
| You Only Live Once | BBC One | Guest | – | |||
| Capital Floyd | – 22 January 2001 | Channel 5 | Presenter | Seven programmes | ||
| Floyd's India | – 17 December 2001 | Channel 5 | Presenter | Eight programmes | ||
| Open House with Gloria Hunniford | Channel 5 | Interviewee | – | |||
| Floyd's Fjord Fiesta | – | Sveriges Television (Sweden) and DR TV (Denmark) | Presenter | Seven programmes | ||
| Diners Interactive | BBC Three | Guest | – | |||
| Balamory | BBC One | Guest cameo | – | |||
| Public Opinion | BBC One | Panellist | – | |||
| Full On Food Christmas Special | BBC Two | Guest | – | |||
| Keith and Keith | Channel 4 | Interviewee | Floyd interviewed by Keith Allen |
| Broadcast | Date | Channel | Notes | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Woman's Hour | BBC Radio 4 | ||||
| BBC Radio 4 | |||||
| Some of These Days | BBC Radio 2 | ||||
| Down Your Way | – 23 November 1987 | BBC Radio 4 | Four episodes | ||
| Some of These Days | BBC Radio 2 | ||||
| Desert Island Discs | BBC Radio 4 | ||||
| Johnnie Walker's Countdown to Christmas | BBC Radio 5 Live | ||||
| – 5 March 1997 | BBC Radio 4 | Six-part series | |||
| BBC Radio 4 |
In 2006 and 2007, Floyd toured Britain with an unscripted, one-man show entitled Floyd Uncorked: The Life of a Bon Viveur.